Question Struggling to get motherboard ready for Windows 11 upgrade

[spdragoo]

Mods, FYI, if this doesn't belong in this section, please move it.

Yes, I understand I missed the deadline. I'd put it off during the summer, & some personal emergencies took a bit of precedence. My laptop converted just fine, but had to change some BIOS settings on my desktop.

Which is where I'm running into problems.

System information:

• CPU: Ryzen 5 5600X
• Motherboard: ASUS PRIME X570-P
  • BIOS: v. 3001
• RAM: 16GB
• Drive setup:
  • Primary (C: 256GB SSD
  • Secondary #1: 4TB HDD
  • Secondary #2: 1TB HDD
  • Secondary #3: 1TB HDD

I've already verified & confirmed that TPM 2.0 is enabled in the BIOS. My issue is that, when I first set up this machine some years back (was originally a Windows 7 machine, then upgraded for free to Win10), I set up the boot SSD as an MBR drive...& Secure BIOS needs to be GPT.

I have attempted to run the MBR2GPT.exe tool multiple times, & keep being told "Cannot find room for the EFI system partition" and "MBR2GPT: Conversion Failed".

Without the conversion to GPT file format, I can't install Win11. Tried multiple times, & I'm not comfortable with any of the so-called 'registry hacks' that are supposed to fool the installer (particularly since they focus on the TPM portion, which isn't a problem).

I do not want to do a "clean" install, because I don't need to...& shouldn't need to when my laptop didn't need one.

I've included screenshots from CPU-Z (CPU & motherboard), Disk Management, & the command prompt (which I ran as an administrator).

I've seen some sites that might indicate that it's the "System Reserved" and "Recovery Partition" portions of Disk 0 (the SSD). I'm just worried because I don't think I ever made a full ISO copy of the Win10 installation disk (just maybe have the original Win7 DVD somewhere), so I don't want to ruin anything on the SSD that will make my PC unbootable. So do I just remove those partitions? Or do I need to do something else?

 

[bba-tcg]

Since you plan on upgrading to 11, you could delete the recovery partition, extend drive c: and then run the mbr2gpt command again. It should be able to shrink drive c: enough to make the efi partition. Then, when you do the upgrade, Windows 11 should remake the recovery (winre) partition, even if it ends up being slightly smaller.

As always, a backup before doing this is recommended but probably not required.

 

[mikeymikec]

Back up the recovery partition before deleting it is one bit of advice I'd give.

I'm wondering though if it's failing to shrink the OS partition. What happens if you shrink the OS partition by say 200MB, leave a gap, then run mbr2gpt?

 

[bba-tcg]

Back up the recovery partition before deleting it is one bit of advice I'd give.

I'm wondering though if it's failing to shrink the OS partition. What happens if you shrink the OS partition by say 200MB, leave a gap, then run mbr2gpt?

mbr2gpt would still want to shrink the OS partition.

Edit: If it wasn't so inflexible, it could just as easily shrink the recovery partition. His screenshot shows that the recovery partition is empty - having 851 MB free space.

 

[mikeymikec]

The other thing I'd try is running mbr2gpt from a Windows Setup memory stick.

 

[manly]

EaseUS Partition Manager free?

Convert MBR to GPT Without Losing Data in Windows

The correct method could make converting an MBR disk to a GPT disk easy and efficient. Pick and follow the suitable way with a simple guide to successfully convert your disk from MBR to GPT on Windows PC.

www.pcworld.com

 

[pcswig13]

Disregard my former post, pls. I had an "Aha!" moment and realized I was asking the wrong questions wrt GPT vs NTFS.
I edited the original post with my new information. Apologies to anyone who read this earlier.

I have this same issue with a Ryzen 5 5600, Gigabyte B450 Aorus Pro Wifi system. I am doing this update for a friend, and things started at the Rev 1.x BIOS level (F1). I started by "walking" the BIOS up going through several interim updates to get to F63, which looks like the minimum that will support Win11.

The TPM is now enabled, but I can't get the secure boot part done. This is a machine someone else built 4 years ago and now asked me to upgrade (was a Ryzen 2400G CPU) and do the Win11 update. When it was built, the C: drive (2.5 SSD) was set up as an MBR disk, and formatted to NTFS and for some reason it has four partitions. So, mbr2gpt won't work and neither will the tools available online as all seem to require 3 partitions or less to do the conversion.
My solution is to clone the Win10 install onto the larger drive and then use the cloned drive as the boot drive. I should be able to then set the BIOS secure boot option to be available. We will see.



Gigabyte B450 Aorus Pro WiFi (F63 BIOS)
Ryzen 5600
16 GB RAM (2x8)
AMD Radeon RX560 (4gb) video
Sandisk 480gb SSD primary drive (250gb free)
Sandisk 1tg SSD secondary data drive (clean drive)

Thanks in advance for any advice!

 

[mikeymikec]

A GB board I used in recent years required a BIOS setting change to do with the state of UEFI / secure boot, a setting that switches the board from something like setup mode to standard mode IIRC.

- edit - this is maybe a more useful resource:

https://www.gigabyte.com/uk/Support/Consumer/FAQ/4395

 

[bba-tcg]

Disregard my former post, pls. I had an "Aha!" moment and realized I was asking the wrong questions wrt GPT vs NTFS.
I edited the original post with my new information. Apologies to anyone who read this earlier.

I have this same issue with a Ryzen 5 5600, Gigabyte B450 Aorus Pro Wifi system. I am doing this update for a friend, and things started at the Rev 1.x BIOS level (F1). I started by "walking" the BIOS up going through several interim updates to get to F63, which looks like the minimum that will support Win11.

The TPM is now enabled, but I can't get the secure boot part done. This is a machine someone else built 4 years ago and now asked me to upgrade (was a Ryzen 2400G CPU) and do the Win11 update. When it was built, the C: drive (2.5 SSD) was set up as an MBR disk, and formatted to NTFS and for some reason it has four partitions. So, mbr2gpt won't work and neither will the tools available online as all seem to require 3 partitions or less to do the conversion.
My solution is to clone the Win10 install onto the larger drive and then use the cloned drive as the boot drive. I should be able to then set the BIOS secure boot option to be available. We will see.



Gigabyte B450 Aorus Pro WiFi (F63 BIOS)
Ryzen 5600
16 GB RAM (2x8)
AMD Radeon RX560 (4gb) video
Sandisk 480gb SSD primary drive (250gb free)
Sandisk 1tg SSD secondary data drive (clean drive)

Thanks in advance for any advice!

I perused the manual for that motherboard and don't see secure boot mentioned at all.

 

[mikeymikec]

I perused the manual for that motherboard and don't see secure boot mentioned at all.

Oddly the product page for that board doesn't have one of those happy little "Windows 11 Ready" type claims, but the BIOS info for BIOS update F62 says, "Change default status of AMD PSP fTPM to Enabled for addressing basic Windows 11 requirements", and since Secure Boot is one of those 'allegedly requirements' for Win11, logically it's got to be able to do it.

 

[bba-tcg]

Oddly the product page for that board doesn't have one of those happy little "Windows 11 Ready" type claims, but the BIOS info for BIOS update F62 says, "Change default status of AMD PSP fTPM to Enabled for addressing basic Windows 11 requirements", and since Secure Boot is one of those 'allegedly requirements' for Win11, logically it's got to be able to do it.

Yes, it should be able to, but it's not obvious from what I saw. I remember some Acer BIOSes required an administrative password before you could enable secure boot, but the option was there, you just couldn't select it without setting a password. But secure boot wasn't listed anywhere in the manual for this board. I suppose that it could actually be an option, just erroneously ommited from publication.

 

[mikeymikec]

Yes, it should be able to, but it's not obvious from what I saw. I remember some Acer BIOSes required an administrative password before you could enable secure boot, but the option was there, you just couldn't select it without setting a password. But secure boot wasn't listed anywhere in the manual for this board. I suppose that it could actually be an option, just erroneously ommited from publication.

My point is that why would GB mention addressing Windows 11's system requirements if the board can't fulfil Win11's requirements anyway. The only valid answer to that question that I can think of is "because they're stupid"

I also would have thought that this page would say something like: "on GB boards that are labelled as Win11 compatible" or some kind of weasel wording that when read between basically states that not all GB AM4 boards are Win11 compatible. It's one thing to screw up the notes of a particular BIOS update, but to not get this right on some sort of level would surely cause chaos for GB's customer services teams.

I have a pretty low opinion of GB but I don't think that even they would screw up this badly.

 

[bba-tcg]

My point is that why would GB mention addressing Windows 11's system requirements if the board can't fulfil Win11's requirements anyway. The only valid answer to that question that I can think of is "because they're stupid"

I also would have thought that this page would say something like: "on GB boards that are labelled as Win11 compatible" or some kind of weasel wording that when read between basically states that not all GB AM4 boards are Win11 compatible. It's one thing to screw up the notes of a particular BIOS update, but to not get this right on some sort of level would surely cause chaos for GB's customer services teams.

I have a pretty low opinion of GB but I don't think that even they would screw up this badly.

I have no way to know why they would mention it. Whatever they advertise, i didn't see the option in the manual. Also, secure boot doesn't have to be enabled in order to meet windows 11 requirements, the PC just has to be capable of secure boot.

As a general practice, I avoid gigabyte boards.

 

[quikah]

I have no way to know why they would mention it. Whatever they advertise, i didn't see the option in the manual. Also, secure boot doesn't have to be enabled in order to meet windows 11 requirements, the PC just has to be capable of secure boot.

As a general practice, I avoid gigabyte boards.

Disable CSM Support. This is an odly named feature that gives you the legacy boot option, disable makes it into UEFI boot. That should give you a secureboot option, maybe...

 

[mikeymikec]

Disable CSM Support. This is an odly named feature that gives you the legacy boot option, disable makes it into UEFI boot. That should give you a secureboot option, maybe...

Is that a GB board quirk? It certainly doesn't apply to all the Asus boards I've used.

 

[bba-tcg]

Disable CSM Support. This is an odly named feature that gives you the legacy boot option, disable makes it into UEFI boot. That should give you a secureboot option, maybe...

Rereading the OP's last post, I see that he hasn't managed to get his disk to GPT yet, so obviously he hasn't switched to UEFI boot. So possibly this is true. But, as mentioned before, I see nothing in the manual that says anything about secure boot. Hopefully, it's just an omission. If he follows the same posting schedule, we may know in about 3 weeks.

Also, you can have UEFI boot with CSM still enabled, though I do think you can not have secure boot with CSM enabled.

 

[quikah]

Is that a GB board quirk? It certainly doesn't apply to all the Asus boards I've used.

Probably, this thread seemed to meander to pcswig13's talk about his friends Gigabyte board...

OPs problem is clear from the error, there isn't enough space on the drive to convert. He could try to shrink the reserve and recovery partitions by a couple MB each.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

I'm so damn glad I won't need to go through the OP's hassle. I had to do it back in 2017. I mean . . . I started out building a system with a 600GB HDD, then converted to an SATA SSD, and finally changed MBR to GPT.

What a PAIN in the ASS!